We’re leaving for Aruba in six days. My bags are mostly packed. My vows are written. The welcome bags are finished. The details have been confirmed. Even the work stuff is pretty much wrapped up.

We wanted to make space for the inevitable crises. And they’ve certainly come.

On Friday, Roscoe woke up vomiting blood. We had to move our schedules around to rush him to the vet and have every test under the sun. Six hundred dollars of testing later, and we found out he has an ulcer. So he’s been on new medicine and a special diet since then. It’s not the ideal before we leave the country for almost two weeks, but all things considered, we’re grateful it’s a relatively minor issue with a good prognosis. And he’s already a lot better less than three days later.

From the vet, we rushed home to clean the dozen of boxes and bags lying in our living room from packing, And we had about 20 minutes to do it, since Garrett’s mom was about to arrive for the weekend.

I inhaled sushi and jumped on a Prima Materia call, in which my audio ended up cutting out (I didn’t have time to test it, clearly).

From Thursday through Sunday, we found out that 13 of our guests had their flights either completely canceled or delayed with a five or so hour layover—most of which was due to a pilot strike in Colombia. People were going to miss events from our weekend or events they had to get back for. And, with the state of the rest of the Caribbean, Aruba is almost completely sold out.

After a few phones calls to our amazing contacts, we were able to secure everyone otherwise sold out rooms with almost no inconvenience.

But, with all that said, what I’m most amazed about is how easy all of it has seemed. This entire wedding planning process has been really easy for us—in some part, I’m sure, to my psychotic spreadsheets and task management programs (I do run a business, after all). But even the crises have been full of ease.

On Friday, when I saw Roscoe’s blood, I texted Garrett immediately that he better see if he can come home from work. I called the vet and talked it through with them. Then I sent off a few e-mails to move things around, jumped in the shower, and was ready to go exactly when Garrett got home. Forty-five minutes from seeing the vomit, we were both able to change our schedules and were sitting in the waiting room with him.

It reminds me why we’re getting married in the first place. Because we’re a team. We live life together. And deal with whatever comes up.

When one of us is having a mental breakdown, the other can snap him out of it. We pause. We listen to one another. We make realistic plans of action. And we’re a team.

On the day of my legal wedding, I was able to do a Prima Materia episode about “What’s the point of getting married?’ It’s a fair question. Because, to some extent, the religious and financial reasons for marriage are falling away. And, even more outdated than marriage is the big elaborate wedding. Is it really necessary to blow tons of money on a glorified party?

I got to discuss these topics in a previous blog post and on Prima Materia, but these last few days,, as we were scrambling to care for Roscoe, clean the house, pack, help people get rooms rescheduled, and finalize last-minute details, I was really struck by the power of getting married and planning an elaborate wedding—especially a three-day celebration in Aruba.

It’s a great metaphor for the life we build together. A true act of artistry. A clear and conscious creation to show the world exactly who we are. And, no matter how much planning or visualizing we put in, it’s bound to be filled with problems crises, and things generally going awry. And it’s how we work together as a team—in this good times and bad. When things are flowing well and convenient and—especially—when they’re not. It’s how flexible we can be. How understanding and compassionate we can be. How we can make it all work. That determines the life we’ll live together.

We can plan all we want. But life happens. In fact, that’s where life is. In the spaces where the plans go awry.

Because I’m not marrying Garrett for this naïve vision of happiness. I’m marry him for a real life together. And I’m so grateful to get to put my heart and Soul into an art exhibition that we call a wedding with him. And then watch as we navigate it all together. Being a team. Handling it all together. Letting it be easy. Even when it’s hard. Letting it be easy.

We leave for Aruba in six days. And more is bound to go off-plan. But, then again, we have a whole lifetime together now. And plenty is bound to go off-plan.

And that’s the adventure I’m getting married for.

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